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President Obama’s Asia Trip: Implications for China-U.S. Relations

NOW

May 01, 2014

President Obama capped a four-nation visit to Asia with the announcement of a security agreement with the Philippines. While China was not one of the President’s stops, relations with the People’s Republic loomed large as a back drop for his visits to Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, and the Philippines. We spoke with former U.S. Ambassador to China, J. Stapleton Roy about the significance of the trip.

About J. Stapleton RoyAmbassador J. Stapleton (Stape) Roy is a Distinguished Scholar and Founding Director Emeritus of the Kissinger Institute on China and the United States at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC.

Stape Roy was born in China and spent much of his youth there during the upheavals of World War II and the communist revolution, where he watched the battle for Shanghai from the roof of the Shanghai American School. He joined the US Foreign Service immediately after graduating from Princeton in 1956, retiring 45 years later with the rank of Career Ambassador, the highest in the service.

In 1978 he participated in the secret negotiations that led to the establishment of US-PRC diplomatic relations. During a career focused on East Asia and the Soviet Union, Stape’s ambassadorial assignments included Singapore, China, and Indonesia. His final post with the State Department was as Assistant Secretary for Intelligence and Research.

On retirement he joined Kissinger Associates, Inc., a strategic consulting firm, before joining the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in September 2008 to head the newly created Kissinger Institute. In 2001 he received Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson Award for Distinguished Public Service.